6 Tips to Show Your Children Love

See Your Children As God Sees Them

Children are a blessing in our lives. Yes, they are often challenging. Yes, they often bring us the greatest fatigue and frustration we have ever known. Conversely, they bring us the greatest joy. Have you ever loved anyone with such ease? Your child is a child of God. Keep that eternal perspective in mind when your 2 year old tells you, “No! I do it myself!”

Childlike Attitude

Leman says to not take yourself too seriously. Play with your children. I am very familiar with the desire to get things done. I am task oriented and a work-before-play sort of gal. Those aren’t bad qualities, but the reality is that there will always be work. No matter how many times you do the dishes, they are going to get dirty again. I am not saying we should let things go, but we can relax.

We can take time with our children. After we eat lunch, my children go outside to play. I always want to clean up the kitchen before joining them. A few days ago, I decided I would put away the perishables and then go play with them. We had a lot of fun and the kitchen didn’t complain at all about being dirty a couple of extra hours. My little sister is so great with kids. Kids love her because she gets down and plays with them, and she enjoys it! She isn’t sitting there thinking of all the other, more important things she can be doing. She is just enjoying her time playing with the kids. She has fun. I have never met a child that didn’t love my little sister.

Direct Eye Contact

I of course have to add my cultural caveat here. If direct eye contact isn’t appropriate in your culture, insert a culturally appropriate item here. For the average person living in the USA, eye contact is very important to show your interest. This might sound easy, but it gets to be challenging. Your child will approach you while you are working on something and want to talk. You will have to tell yourself to look at your child and give him your attention. Eye contact is an important non-verbal cue that tells your listener that you are interested and engaged in the conversation.

Physically Express Love

Give hugs and kisses. Cuddle as your read your bedtime stories. Pat the back when he has done something right. Have fun and tickle. Show your child physical affection.

Be A Good Listener

Remember the eye contact. Be prepared to listen to the same thing over and over. Respond to what they are saying, and try to be more creative than, “Really?” “Mmmm.” “Uh-huh.” For young children, it helps to repeat back what they just said. It makes them happy to see that they can communicate to you. Don’t interrupt and don’t habitually be too busy for your child.

Spend Time

Time spent together doesn’t have to be extravagant. It can be sweeping the kitchen floor, going for a walk, praying, eating, etc. When I was pregnant with McKenna, I was sick a lot. I had to wake up before Brayden and Kaitlyn in order to eat breakfast before I fed them. They didn’t like it when I didn’t eat with them.

At first I tried to make my time useful by doing the dishes while they ate, but I found they were much happier if I sat at the table with them while they ate food and talked with them. I am reminded of a country song that talks about a father being too busy for his son. Eventually, the father is old and wants to spend time with his son, who is now too busy for him. Your children are only highly interested in your time for so long. Then they start being highly interested in friends and other activities.

Take advantage of the time you have while they really want to be with you. You can then build a bond and set a precedent. You can’t expect your teenager to sit and eat meals with the family if you haven’t done so in the past (not to say you can’t start new traditions or habits, but it will be harder).

Conclusion

You are going to want your child to grow up feeling loved and grow up feeling comfortable spending time and talking with you. These six tips can help you show love to your child–though it definitely isn’t an exhaustive list. It is just a good starting point 🙂

Valerie, also known as The Babywise Mom, is the mother to four children. She has been blogging on Babywise and general parenting since 2007. She has a degree in technical writing and loves using those skills to help parents be the best parents they can be! Read her book, The Babywise Mom Nap Guide, to get help on sleep from birth through the preschool years. You can also find her writing at Babywise.life, Today Parenting, and Her View From Home. Read more about Valerie and her family on the About page. Follow her on Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram for more tips and helps.

12 Comments

Amy

July 2, 2009 / 3:29 PM

Loved this post — especially the part about there always being work to do. I too am task oriented and "work before play" minded and this is a struggle for me day after day! Thanks for the great post — I'm planning on reading Leman's book now!

My favorite post to date. Maybe it's because we're both LDS (an assumption I'm making about you that seems fairly obvious) but I 100% agree with this post.BTW – your blog got me through PPD with my second baby. Right after I was put on anti-depressants I started Babywise (couldn't do it with my 1st who had severe colic… long story). But it helped save my family.Thank you.

I like that Leman's tips seem to cover all the love languages. Nice post, maybe this will convince the rest of the world that we Babywise moms in fact show affection to our kids, lol! Then again, maybe they will still refuse to be convinced but that's okay. I love sitting on the floor and playing with my kiddo, sometimes it's hard to find that balance though between spending time with him and yet giving him space to learn how to play with his toys on his own.

I too am a too task-oriented and "work-before-play". A daily struggle that I am not fond of. I've been trying this week to show my 4 yr old daughter more physical love (hugs and kisses, etc.) so this is good for me. I'm going to print it out and put it on my fridge! Oh yeah, and I'm going to go read the book. 🙂

I also wanted to say BRAVO about your entire blog. I found it earlier this week and in just 3 days of using the tips and helps from your writing my 6 week old son is doing so much better and just as important so am I, my husband, and 2 year old. Thanks for doing what you do in your writing and being so amazing! An answer to my prayers to find this!

Amy, work before play is one of my biggest hurdles to overcome as a mom! I try to find the balance between keeping things clean and orderly and letting things wait and have fun with my kids. It is a hard balance 🙂

Good point about all the love languages, Manda. I don't think it will convince the nay-sayers though 🙂 Balance is hard to find in all areas I guess. Moderation is best–the trick is finding how to apply that moderation.

Beth, that is what Kaitlyn needs, too, and I am not good at showing it. Physical affection is dead last on my needs. She is good about informing me when I need to sit down and cuddle with her. I just need to be more proactive so she doesn't have to ask for it!